The Art Of Deception
Written for the Writing Quotes challenge by SoUsay234
Prompts: I don't know you, lip, Bigger Than Love – My Favourite Highway, insomnia, ordinary.
"We are all ordinary people. But even an ordinary secretary, or a housewife or a teenager can within their own small ways turn on a small light in a dark room."
"I don't know you." declares the girl sitting upon a bed.
"What do you mean?" the boy sitting on a windowsill asks, a puzzled expression upon his face "You've known me for four years."
"Well I can't have known you very well if I never knew you could be that brave." the girl replies sagely, nodding her head.
The boy blushes, but says nothing more letting a comfortable silence fall between them. They are both there for the same reason: because they can't sleep. They've just fought in a major battle (which I am glad to say they won) therefore it's only right that sleep should elude them.
They're alone in the Ravenclaw girls' dormitory, thankful for the peace and quiet.
The girl moves to sit next to him, she follows his gaze and her eyes land on the moon. It sits almost alone in the sky like a giant lantern, a guide of sorts. A few starts are dotted in the surrounding sky, shining for those who watch closely enough.
"Of course you know me Luna. Even I never knew I could be that brave…" the boy sighs. His lip is swollen, he knows he should have gone to see Madam Pomfrey, but he just couldn't bear it.
"I saw him before he died. Fred, I mean." he explains "I can't believe he's gone. Do you know what the last thing he said to me was?"
"What?" Luna asks softly, even she herself was having trouble to believe the boisterous Weasley was gone.
"'Well done Neville mate, you gave those disgusting excuses for wizard's hell when Gred and I were gone! Always knew you were a true Gryffindor!'"
"It's true you know Neville. If it weren't for you there wouldn't have been anyone willing to fight." she says in her usually clam voice "You were the one who called us to battle."
Neville blushed once again. How he adored the girl sitting next to him. She had been one of the few who had always believed in him. She was his best friend.
He wrapped him arm around his shoulders, pulling her closer towards him.
"But you know I'm ordinary, don't you Luna. I've always been a bit stupid and clumsy, just because I rubbed a special coin and wrote graffiti on the walls it doesn't make me any different." he proclaimed.
She just smiled, linking her hand with his.
"You'll always be special to me Neville." she promises softly.
Neville could always count upon Luna to make him feel better. Ever since the day he had met her and she had always been kind to him, even after his mimbulus mimbletonia had exploded foul-smelling liquid all over her copy of 'The Quibbler'.
He had sworn he would never talk to her again after that humiliating experience, and was therefore very surprised when she had come to sit next to him at the Gryffindor table one lunchtime, telling him all about Nargles and Crumple-Horned Snorcack's. He had seen Seamus and Dean trying not to laugh, but he didn't care. He'd finally found someone else like him: An outcast.
Perhaps it was wrong of him to think of her like that, but in a way, he knew he was right. Someone who walked around wearing radish earrings was not normal.
"You're just a brave as me, Luna." Neville said. "You were locked up in that Mansion for months. Everyone thought that they'd… Killed you, or something."
"But they didn't. Dobby the house-elf saved us all, and now I'm right here with you." Luna sighed dreamily. "Exactly where I want to be."
At that something inside Neville changed, surely he wasn't going to let he go after that confession, was he? He wouldn't say that he didn't feel the same. He refused to deceive her like that. He'd never been very good at the famous art of deception. Hell, he could barely tell a lie without messing it up.
Taking a deep breath Neville gently raised Luna's face so that she was looking into his eyes, and in the pale yellow light of the morning sun, on the day after they had won a battle which they had been fighting for so many years, he kissed her. A sweet, simple kiss that said everything.
When they pulled away from one another, smiles graced both of their faces.
"Funny there isn't any mistletoe around here," Luna noted "or I'd suspect this was the work of Nargles"
Neville grinned.
Oh, how he adored this girl. This crazy, perfect girl.
They sat in that windowsill until they awoke after sleep had eventually found them The left holding hands and whispering quietly to one another.
This really was a new era, for them all.
My first Neville/Luna! I was so upset when I read the epilogue (although, weren't we all really?) and saw these two weren't together. But as long as there a fandom world, we can all continue to live in denial until the end of our days.